Corinthian Midwinters

February 20, 2012

"Any time you can actually finish a Corinthian Midwinter race is a good race by me," remarked one racer in this weekend's final two days of midwinter madness. Things were looking grim for the start on Saturday with a light southerly wind and a heavy ebb tide making a mockery of the National Weather Service prediction of 15 knots from the west.

The race committee postponed for an hour, until just enough of a west wind filled in to send the fast boats off on a double-sausage course to Yellow Bluff and Knox buoys. But what were they thinking? Giving them that course guaranteed a traffic jam at the Knox racing area start line with big fast boats like Farr 36s and Santa Cruz 50s flying through the fleets still starting.

Left to right: Wicked, Sapphire, and Alpha Puppy got around Yellow Bluff and headed, slowly, for Knox. ©2012 norcalsailing.com

This group got caught in a strong river of ebb in the lee of Yellow Bluff and drifted backwards toward the Golden Gate Bridge. Cal 20 crew Paul Sutchek called it, "Kissing the North Tower." ©2012 norcalsailing.com

The RC postponed a second time for the slower fleets as the westerly died. Shortly after 1400, a nice northerly came rushing through and the rest of the fleets were off on a shorter course with a tricky reaching start towards Harding Rock then to the finish back at the Corinthian YC. This was a wise move which provided everyone plenty of time to socialize and bench race back at the docks.

A light air SF Bay 30 start, before the northerly piped up. ©2012 norcalsailing.com

Mary Coleman's Farr 40 Astra. ©2012 norcalsailing.com

Packing the kite aboard Joan Byrne's Olson 911S Heart of Gold. ©2012 Dawn Chesney/norcalsailing.com

Sunday started to look like a repeat of Saturday, with a light southerly, except the RC decided to postpone for a mysterious westerly that only they had predicted. Even the NWS and their fancy supercomputers didn't see anything like a westerly in the future… So everyone waited and some grumbling on the VHF started up. "If you reset now, we can get started," said one racer. "We're going to postpone because we're set up for a westerly, we're expecting a westerly, and if it doesn't fill in, we'll reset and get started. If you want to do RC you should sign up," was the response.

And lo and behold a 15-knot westerly did fill in, and so the race was on with the faster boats sent to Blackaller for the windward mark and the speed-challenged to Harding Rock once again. The only sticky part of the course was around Raccoon Strait and the finish in a much softer breeze and big ebb bringing the racers the usual "Corinthian Midwinters spirit" of frustration at the end. But the boats did finish, which is why, "Any day that you can finish…" well, you know the rest.

Buzz Blackett's Antrim 40 California Condor at the finish on Sunday. ©2012 norcalsailing.com

Jim Snow's Cal 20 Raccoon, which won Non-Spinnaker C, was back on the hard early enough on Sunday for these youngsters to climb aboard and check it out. ©2012 norcalsailing.com

See http://cyc.org for results, and mark your calendars for the Rob Moore Regatta on March 17, a bonus pursuit race.

Left to right: Hank Easom's 8-Meter Yucca, Scott Easom's Farr 30 Eight Ball, and Richard VonEhrenkrook's Cal 20 Can O'Whoopass won the Aotea Team Trophy for San Francisco YC. Their team name? "Hank's 8 Balls O'Whoopass." ©2012 Roxanne Fairbairn/roxshots.smugmug.com